On Sunday I took the Cathedral ridge trail up to the Timberline trail and then hiked off trail up a glacial moraine to the small summit just below Barrett Spur. I love scrambling off trail to this rocky alpine viewpoint with sweeping views of the north flanks of Mt. Hood, three Cascade volcanoes, and an astonishingly up close view of Mt. Hood. I usually access Barrett Spur by taking the Vista Ridge trail up to Wyeast basin and scrambling off trail from there. But sitting on the ridge above McNeil point looking across to Barrett Spur, I've often pondered the possibility of following one of the ridges between McNeil and Cairn Basin. The occasional mention of such scrambles in trip reports confirms it's doable.
Since circumstances dictated a Saturday hike, I was looking for something a bit remote to avoid the crowds I knew would be flooding the usual trails, so it seemed the perfect opportunity to try this off trail scramble.
Map of the route I took. Red are the off-trail portions.
- Route Map
Apparently it was a banner year for beargrass in this area. At the lower elevations it was already gone by, but especially in the open burned areas, the spent blooms dominated the understory. Mid-way up the ridge I began to see some beargrass still blooming.
Once at the Timberline trail I took the trail to McNeil Pt up to the short access trail to the Ladd Creek, about where the trail bends to the right to head towards the point.
(Maps list this as Ladd Creek, but so is the creek on the other side of Cairn basin - eg. CW around the mountain from this point. The two creeks join together below Eden Park to form Ladd Creek, so I suppose this is the West or South branch of the Ladd Creek. Although it appears to drain from the Glissan Glacier, not the Ladd, as the other branch does. So maybe this stretch should be called the Glissan creek. These naming conundrums probably didn't exist 50 years ago, since according to the Forest Service topo maps, what is now a creek was a permanent snow field. )
After the relatively easy crossing here, I took a short break to enjoy the alpine scenery.
After a short break, I continued up the ridge across from the creek. This leads to the moraine separating the Glissan Glacier (to the South) and the Ladd Glacier (to the North). Looking at the terrain and the map, I was faced with a decision: Continue up this moraine, which gets very narrow and steep and also climbs quite high up on the mountain with uncertain travel across snow fields, or descend into the Ladd Creek valley, cross the creek, and ascend the next ridge over. That ridge had what appeared to be a clear shot up to Barrett Spur along surfaces that had the light green blush of vegetation, indicating somewhat more solid footing. On the whole this second ridge seemed the easier route, but required scrambling down the loose and steep side of the moraine. Ladd Creek at this point was covered by snow, so crossing appeared fairly easy. Then a 10 or 15 foot scramble up loose material on the other side. The other option was to go back down and attempt a crossing of Ladd Creek lower down that might not involve scrambling down steep, loose slopes, albeit with the uncertainty of the creek crossing.
In the end I opted for scrambling down and crossing the Ladd over the snow. A hundred feet or so down and across the loose material brought me to the snow-covered creek, and then I was climbing up the other side.
In these pictures of the valley between the two moraines, slightly uphill from where I crossed, you can see the signature U-shape left by the retreating Ladd glacier.
Once on this ridge, it's an easy walk up to Barrett Spur. The little round knob at the base of Barrett Spur is my destination.
Looking beyond the glacial moraine at the ridge above McNeil Pt.
Another view across to the ridge above McNeil Pt, this one higher up, a section I call the Dragon's back:
At a few places the ridge I was traveling gets narrow at the top
but nothing like what the other moraine appears to have. The stretch in the middle of this photo appears to come to a point, with little or nor consolidated surface at the top.
If it is possible to hike along that narrow moraine, you then have to travel across the snowfields to get to Barrett Spur. Here's the upper end of the moraine and a pano of the route one would have to take:
The dramatic cliff a the end of Barrett Spur:
An oasis just before the top:
Photo looking back at the route. If you zoom in you can see the dirt trail leading from the McNeil Pt trail down to Ladd Creek.
I just love the terrain up here, and the amazing views.
After soaking in the views, I started back down. I followed my normal route that goes NE off the summit and joins the Timberline trail East of Cairn Basin. Here's the saddle with a pond just below the little summit.
The descent is an embarrassment of alpine wildflowers.
There as been discussion here before about the source of the dirt mounds that one often sees up on the mountain. Some attribute them to a tunneling animal of some sort, but they are not hollow, and are completely above ground. In the example below, I could lift sections of the dirt and found grass and other vegetation underneath them. My guess is that they are created somehow below the snow fields as they melt, perhaps melting water flowing under the snow deposits the dirt. The example below is something I've never seen before: a section of grass continues from the dirt.
Once reaching the Timberline Trail, I headed West toward Cairn Basin and the Ladd Creek crossing. I normally do this hike from Vista Ridge, and I sort of had forgotten about needing to cross Ladd to get back to Cathedral Ridge. Because I had dawdled coming down through the glorious alpine meadows, it was about 6 pm when I arrived at the creek, and it was roaring heavily with afternoon melt water. After scouting up and down the creek, I finally found a route below the trail with a couple of logs to facilitate the crossing with dry feet.
I briefly enjoyed the view of Mt Hood from Cairn Basin, and then continued down.
On the way down, the evening sun illuminated the trail.
A last look at Barrett Spur.
The foothills in evening's light
As I was driving out, the full moon rose over the slopes of Mt. Hood. Incredible!
The hike was about 11 miles, with around 4000' of gain, and an uncountable number of wildflowers. What a fantastic day! This route is a real winner, with just two reservations: the upper and lower crossing of the Ladd. Depending on conditions, those could be dicey. I'll leave the other moraine to true mountaineers.
